November 2016 Report: State of the U.S. Cash Back Shopping Industry

Cash back shopping websites first came on the scene in the United States in the late 1990’s, and since then the popularity continues to rise exponentially with online shoppers. At Cashbackholic.com, a cash back comparison website launched in 2010 that lists rates for over 10,000 retail stores, traffic has grown steadily at 20-30% annually over the last three years.

Cash back shopping websites easily allow shoppers to earn cash back rewards on their online shopping. Once a shopper signs up and creates a free account at a cash back website, they can search for stores and see the rate of cash back offered. After clicking on an offer, shoppers complete their purchase at the chosen store’s website. Earnings are deposited into the shopper’s cash back website account, and can be withdrawn in the form of a mailed check or electronic payment such as PayPal or a gift card.

Cashbackholic offers an opportunity for shoppers to look up a store and quickly see the rates offered by cash back shopping websites, including Ebates, BeFrugal, ShopatHome and others. One major benefit of Cashbackholic is that the shopper can easily see which cash back websites offer the highest cash back rates. Also, the website is updated multiple times a day with the latest rates and offers.

Given the steady, increasing growth of cash back shopping and the launch of more of cash back websites each year, Cashbackholic took a deeper look at the industry’s major players to see how they line up. They compared the number of stores, the number of stores with the highest cash back rate, and the percentage of stores with the highest cash back rate for 10 cash back websites below:

Cash Back Website

Cash Back Stores

Number of Stores with the Highest Cash Back

% of Stores with the Highest Cash Back

BeFrugal

4,816

3,624

75%

Coupon Cactus

8,536*

3,691*

43%

Ebates

2,082

156

7%

Extrabux

1,515

312

21%

Hoopa Doopla

1,684

184

11%

Mr. Rebates

2,622

261

10%

ShopAtHome.com

2,828

487

17%

Simply Best Coupons

4,128

1,330

32%

Swag Bucks

1,546

113

7%

Top Cashback

3,473

2,245

65%

*= Includes international stores. Per Coupon Cactus website, the website features coupons and cash back for about 4,000 US stores.

The cash back shopping industry is not only experiencing considerable growth each year, but maturing to the point where online shoppers are at a true advantage. The competition of rates between the cash back shopping websites translates into higher cash back rates than ever before. Cashbackholic sees this firsthand with the website’s 2.3 million visitors, 63% of which are repeat users. With this growing awareness and usage of cash back shopping, Cashbackholic is looking forward to continuing to help consumers get the best cash back rates.